The muses are ghosts, and sometimes
they come uninvited.― Stephen King
On Ghosts
Blame it on the quartz.
Call it coffin candle,
foolish fire. A surgery
in Gettysburgh beckons:
Limbs stacked as ricks
at a window.
Call it the staring past.
Call it schism.
Burn the wedding dress.
Call it Chinese grievance.
In Poland, ignus faatua,
“traveller’s lights,” believed
to be spirits of dead
mapmakers. Eat your cabbage
or else they’ll draw “here”
out of sight.
.
by Lea Graham
from This End of the World: Notes to Robert Kroetsch
Apt. 9 Press, 2016; also published in Ditchpoetry.com.